Between Angels and Hell Hounds
by Nakimochiku
Summary: What did it mean, Frog? The Angel? Francis and Arthur discuss The Angel of Mons, oneshot, Fruk, enjoy.


Between Angels and Hell Hounds

"Petit Lapin!" The anxious shout cut through the din of camp, wild eyes searching through the rush of injured soldiers and panicking nurses, hoping that the one place he wouldn't have to step into was the hospital tent.

"I'm here, frog." Arthur answered in a barely audible whisper as Francis approached, fingers tracing over a rosary that Francis had shoved into his pocket on the day they parted ways, smiling widely and saying something like 'Perhaps this war will teach you how to pray, oui?' He sat on a crate near the hospital tent, watching the nurses with eyes that didn't see.

Francis kneeled before him, checking him over for any wounds, hands resting on his knees and forehead resting on his hands in his relief, letting out a soft breath. "I heard you nearly got massacred out there. I was so afraid. How many times have I told you not to do that to me?" He smiled, a wane thing that didn't suit the glamour of his face, trying to keep up the illusion that he didn't care, that they were enemies. Arthur wanted to tell him that it was he who worried Arthur.

Nothing came out.

"I saw an angel." he whispered, fingers curling over the cross once it came to the end of the long circlet of beads, watching them sway in the breeze. He stared at nothing, but moved his eyes to the swirling blue gems set in Francis's face, his confusion evident.

"An angel?" Francis murmured. There was long silence, filled with the screams of men on the operation table and the laughter of men flirting with nurses, trying to ignore the screams. The mud Francis kneeled in soaked into his dirt encrusted uniform, his golden hair swaying in the same breezed that moved the rosary, an expression close to a frown marring his features.

Gently, Arthur smoothed a finger between his brows, resting his hand in the shifting golden hair, soft and fine. "It was an angel, Frog, at Mons. I saw it. So bright."

The frown was back, and Francis held the hand that grasped the rosary. He thought perhaps he should not have given it to Arthur, and ignored that he had hoped it would protect him, or something else ridiculous like that. "I know you're convinced of what you saw, Petit Lapin, but –..."

"It was an angel. It protected us on our retreat. It stopped the Germans. I was at the rear, Frog, I saw it! The other guys saw it too! It was an angel and it saved us." When he turned his unseeing fairy eyes on Francis, desperate for answers or truth or someone to believe him. Tears formed at the corners as he held Francis's hand, the rosary winding between their fingers.

Francis relented. He couldn't resist those eyes. He'd never been able to.

"Alright. I'll believe you, Petit Lapin. It was an angel." He stood and heaved Arthur to his feet, leading him through the camp to a tent. "For now, rest. You're all shaken up." Arthur laughed, a sharp and sardonic sound, crawling into the tent and laying still for a moment. He watched Francis putter about, going through the routine of making tea just the way Arthur liked it.

Miles away, they could hear the crash and scream of shells, and knew that somewhere, one of them was gaining knew scars. Perhaps Ludwig, or Matthew, or perhaps Francis, and he would wake up bleeding tomorrow.

"What does it mean Frog?" Arthur whispered carefully, staring at the canvas roof, avoiding the blue eyes that turned to look at him. "The angel. What does it mean?"

"That everything you know about the world has just gotten fucked over." They laughed like the bitter old men they were, going over times in their minds when that very same thing had happened, leaving them floundering and confused in a time when that couldn't be afforded.

Francis crawled over to him, laying beside him, both in a tangle of warmth and limbs, breaths brushing the other's cheek. It was a familiar position. "And perhaps...," he whispered, an arm wrapping around Arthur's waist and his eyes guarded. "that God has not abandoned us."

Arthur grunted, and closed his eyes. He had seen it, an angel. He had seen it, and he believed it. But God?

Where was God when he had decimated Francis's knights at Agincourt? Where was God when he had burnt his messenger and Francis's love until she was nothing? Where was God when Francis was tearing himself apart at the seams, and his own people raged for blood? Where would God be when mothers weren't able to cry over the smouldering remains of their sons, only bones and pieces of flesh and godforsaken dog tags left of them?

God?

That was a myth he couldn't hold on to.

Owari.


End file.
